


You Make Me Happy (And I'm Sad I Don't Make You Happy Too)

by taylor_writes



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Break Up, Getting Back Together, M/M, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-29
Updated: 2017-01-29
Packaged: 2018-09-20 14:36:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9496019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_writes/pseuds/taylor_writes
Summary: Nursey and Dex break up. A lot of poetry gets written.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Based on this prompt I found on tumblr: “i’m pretty sure if taylor swift and i were in a competition of who could write the most breakup songs in one night, i’d win by a landslide because i still set two plates out for dinner even though i eat alone and it’s almost pathetic because we’ve been broken up for ages but i’m still not over you”
> 
> (all poetry by me)

I still feel you  
In the hole in my chest where my heart should be  
I still miss you  
It’s like I’m chained to this place and I can’t break free  
I still hear you  
Calling my name  
As I go to sleep  
I still want you  
And it won’t go away

Nursey threw the pen across the table, nearly knocking over his glass of wine. Another poem about Dex, just what he didn’t need right now. Or ever again. 

“It’s been months, Nurse, get over it,” he mumbled to himself since he was the only one in the empty apartment. The one they had picked out together because it was close to Nursey’s job and it was also near that park where Dex liked to take his little siblings when they came to visit. 

He slammed the notebook shut and gathered the plates to put in the sink. Five months, and he still set out a place for Dex even though he wasn’t coming back. Will was back in Maine with his family, probably with a new boyfriend who has a “real job.” Because apparently, writing books of poetry didn’t count. Even if the poetry was all about him, which it was. It is. Always will be, probably.

Nursey glanced over at the bookshelf, which held several notebooks of works-in-progress and finished poems. He’d be willing to bet at least half were about Dex, and the other half was probably from high school. Ever since he’d met Will at Samwell, he couldn’t help but write poems about his fellow defenseman. 

Before they were dating, it was poetry about fighting and how he wished they didn’t have to. Then they started dating and there was definitely a phase of sappy love poems, but he’d never admit it. Those were hidden in a shoebox in his closet. And now, in the post-breakup era, it was mostly subtle metaphors about autumn sneaking into everything he wrote no matter how hard he tried to avoid it. Dex was a part of him now, like a branch is part of a tree. He was the tree and Dex was all the branches, all the leaves, everything.

\--  
1 year earlier  
\--

I could say you’re on my mind again  
Really you never left  
Close one door to open another just to find you waiting  
And today I made you smile again  
One for the million you give me  
I swore I wouldn’t fall this time but you’ve got me debating

“Nursey, that’s so cheesy!” Dex was grinning and blushing at the same time, and Nursey wished he had a camera to keep this moment forever. 

He rolled his eyes and put the notebook away, secretly pleased that Dex liked his latest poem. He leaned forward on the bed to kiss his boyfriend. Dex was his boyfriend! Every time he thought that, he became impossibly happier. He was Dex’s boyfriend. They were together. He was in love.

\--  
6 months earlier  
\--

Time  
Is running out for me to show you  
You’re all I’ve ever needed  
And I’ve waited so long  
You  
Go on your way, I follow hopelessly behind  
Trying to convince you I’m worth it  
Even though I’m not

“You wouldn’t understand! We don’t all have trust funds waiting for us, Nursey. Some of us have to work for our money!” Dex shouted, slamming the door and shutting himself in their bedroom. Guess Nursey was sleeping on the couch tonight.

All he’d wanted was to pay off Dex’s student loans. They were together, they lived together, they were practically married. (Nursey had a ring in his desk, but Dex didn’t know that. Didn’t know how serious he was about this relationship)

Dex didn’t speak to him for a week.

\--  
5 months earlier  
\--

I still think about you  
Random times  
When I’m alone, when I’m not  
And I’m sure I get this weird look on my face  
Happy and sad at the same time  
Because I am  
You make me happy  
And I’m sad I don’t make you happy too  
Simple as that

The silence was suffocating. Everywhere he turned there were memories. Him and Dex baking in the kitchen, sending Bitty pictures of whatever disasters came out of the oven. The couch where they’d cuddled last week and watched the entire Harry Potter series, only stopping for food and bathroom breaks. And, of course, the bedroom. Their bedroom. That now had the sheets pulled up and one bedside table as empty as the day they’d bought it. There was only one toothbrush in the bathroom.

Dex was gone. 

\--  
Present day  
\--

“Five-year reunion” announced the card in the mailbox. “RSVP as soon as possible” threatened the email in Nursey’s inbox. “What if Dex is there?” worried Nursey’s brain. “What if he isn’t?” worried Nursey’s heart.

Fuck it. He was going, and if Dex was there, then he would deal with it.

\--  
Ten days later  
\--

“Nursey?”

He knew that voice. It was the same one from his dreams, where he’d wake up crying in the morning because it had felt so real, it was like he was actually there.

“Dex.” He turned around and wow, he still looked the same as the day he walked out the door. Nursey still wanted him just as much. It was as if no time had passed at all. Except it had, and they were broken up, and he couldn’t grab Dex and kiss him but god, he wanted to.

“Do you want some punch? I have an extra. I always seem to grab two of these things,” he held out the plastic cup full of some type of unidentifiable fruit punch. 

Nursey smiled, just a little, and took it. 

“So-” Nursey started.

“How-” Dex began at the same time. “You first,” he said.

“How have you been?” Nursey asked, trying to hide how curious he was to see if Dex was alright without him, if he never really meant anything to him in the first place.

Dex looked at the ground as if it held all the secrets to the universe. “I… I’ve missed you, Derek.” 

“I’ve missed you too, Will,” he mumbled in response, staring at that red hair, those freckles, that blush that he’d wanted to keep forever. 

Will took a deep breath and said what he’d been rehearsing in his head for the past five months.

“Listen, Nursey, I want to apologize. I shouldn’t have been so mad at you, and I’m sorry for all the things I said when I was angry. I know our relationship wasn’t perfect, especially towards the end, and I completely understand if you never want to see me again. But I’ve thought about you every day since you left and every time I go to an event I grab two drinks like you’re going to be there by my side, but you aren’t and I- I really wish you were.”

“Will,” Nursey reached out and grabbed the hand not holding the cup. “I miss you like crazy. All my poems are about you, even when I don’t mean for them to be. You’re in my dreams all the time and I wake up and you’re not there and it kills me. I still set the table for two because I’m hoping you’ll come back and I’ve still got the ring in my desk from when I was going to propose to you and I just really wish you would come back.”

“So,” Dex was back to looking at the ground, something he always did when he was nervous. “Would you like to ditch this thing and go get a cup of coffee?”

“Yeah,” Nursey smiled at him. “Yeah, I really would.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come yell with me on [tumblr!](http://omg-zimbits-trash.tumblr.com)


End file.
